Update: as we apended in an earlier post, asked if the NSC move was a demotion for Bannon, Pence said "not for Steve, not for Ton. These are very highly valued members of our administration. They're going to continue to play important policy roles. ButI think with H.R. McMaster’s addition as our National Security Advisor – a man of extraordinary background in the military – this is just a natural evolution to ensure the National Security Council is organized in a way that best serves the president in resolving and making those difficult decisions," Pence said.

That, however, conflicts with what the NYT reported this evening, when the newspaper (as usual relying on "a White House official who, like others, insisted on anonymity to discuss internal deliberations") said that "Bannon resisted the move, even threatening at one point to quit if it went forward... Bannon’s camp denied that he had threatened to resign and spent the day spreading the word that the shift was a natural evolution, not a signal of any diminution of his outsize influence."

His allies said privately that Mr. Bannon had been put on the principals committee to keep an eye on Mr. Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, a retired three-star general who lasted just 24 days before being forced out for misleading Vice President Mike Pence and other White House officials about what he had discussed with Russia’s ambassador. With Mr. Flynn gone, these allies said, there was no need for Mr. Bannon to remain, but they noted that he had kept his security clearance.

Of course, the whether the NYT report is trustworthy is just as pertinent.

* * *

In what the biggest shake-up at the White House since Mike Flynn resigned in February, moments ago Bloomberg reported that President Trump has reorganized his National Security Council on Wednesday, removing his chief strategist, Stephen Bannon as well as downgrading the role of his Homeland Security Adviser, Tom Bossert, while elevating national intelligence director, Dan Coats, and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine Corps General Joseph Dunford, who will again be "regular attendees" of the NSC’s principals committee.

According to Reuters, Bannon's removal from the NSC was seen as a boost to national security adviser H.R. McMaster, who officials said has struggled to work together with Bannon.

McMASTER has made it clear inside WH that he wants NSC to be non-political, especially as he crafts NSC strategy for admin...

Wednesday’s change means Mr. Bannon is no longer part of the NSC. He is still permitted to attend such meetings but won’t automatically be invited to each one.

The WSJ adds that "the decision to boot Bannon was made by Trump’s new national security adviser, Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster" while another senior administration official said Mr. Trump “signed off on all the changes.”

Bannon said in a statement: “Susan Rice operationalized the NSC during the last administration. I was put on to ensure that it was de-operationalized. General McMaster has returned the NSC to its proper function.”

Additionally, the Joint Chiefs chairman and intelligence director are having their roles on the principals committee restored, the report said.

Bloomberg adds that Susan Rice's successor, National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, was given responsibility for setting the agenda for meetings of the NSC or the Homeland Security Council, and was authorized to delegate that authority to Bossert, at his discretion, according to the filing.

The Trump administration has changed the makeup of the National Security Council Principals Committee. Here are the differences. pic.twitter.com/52aAlqmNOO

A White House official said that Bannon was placed on the committee in part to monitor Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, and attended just one meeting. He’s no longer needed with McMaster in charge of the council, the official said.

“Steve was put there as a check on [Mike] Flynn,” a second official told the WSJ, referring to the former national security adviser who was forced to resign in February over undisclosed contacts with Russia. With Gen. McMaster now in charge, “there was no longer a need [for Bannon] because they share the same views,” the official said. “The idea initially was to make sure Flynn implemented the vision they had talked about,” the official said.

Said otherwise, perhaps Bannon - and Trump - simply saw no need him being on the committee any longer with Flynn gone; alternatively this could merely be spin.

The memorandum also makes the director of the Central Intelligence Agency a permanent member of the principals committee and restores the chairman of the U.S. military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Director of National Intelligence as permanent members after they were initially downgraded from that status.

As a reminder, back in January, in the first of many unexpected shakeups, Bannon was elevated to a position on the NSC principals committee. The move drew criticism from some members of Congress and Washington’s foreign policy establishment. Republicans and Democrats questioned whether Mr. Bannon’s addition would politicize the White House’s national-security decisions.

The WSJ adds that White House officials had said if Mr. McMaster wanted to change Mr. Bannon’s status, he had the authority to do so. The senior administration official said Mr. Bannon had worked with Mr. McMaster to implement changes in the NSC, and now that they were well underway, he could step aside.

The regulatory filing showing all the changes at the NSC is presented below:

President-elect Donald Trump named some very important White House positions over the weekend. His selection of one of his campaign managers, Stephen K. Bannon, to chief strategist and senior adviser immediately stirred controversy. Like Trump, Bannon is a Washington outsider who has never been elected to office, and he is most known for running a controversial website. Here's what you need to know about Bannon:

1. Bannon is the executive chairman of Breitbart News, a website for the "alt-right."

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Breitbart News is a divisive right-wing opinion and news outlet, known for offensive headlines like “Bill Kristol: Republican Spoiler, Renegade Jew,” “Trannies 49 Xs Higher HIV Rate,” and “Birth Control Makes Women Unattractive and Crazy.” According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, the site promotes racist, anti-Muslim, and anti-immigrant ideas, and it has been accused of white nationalism, a movement that opposes multiculturalism and believes in the supremacy of the white race. Bannon, who is on leave from Breitbart, described his ideology to Mother Jones as "nationalist," but not necessarily white nationalist. Former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke called Bannon's selection "excellent," and Peter Brimelow, who runs the white nationalist site VDARE, called it "amazing."

Bannon, who has been with the site for about a decade and ran the business out of the basement of his D.C. townhouse, according to a Bloomberg profile, told Mother Jones about the site, however, "We're the platform for the alt-right." According to NPR, "The views of the alt-right are widely seen as anti-Semitic and white supremacist."

The site was hugely successful during the 2016 presidential campaign, thanks to social media. On election night, Breitbart's Facebook page had the fourth-highest number of user interactions on the whole platform, beating CNN, Fox News, and the New York Times, according to the New York Times.

2. He started a nonprofit to investigate politicians.

Bannon is the founding chairman of Government Accountability Institute, or GAI, a nonprofit that investigates politicians and delivers findings to mainstream media outlets, like Newsweek and ABC News, according to Bloomberg.

GAI’s president, Peter Schweizer, wrote Clinton Cash as well as the ebook, Bush Bucks. Clinton Cash — which looked at donations made to the Clinton Foundation, a topic of constant attention during Trump’s campaign — was later made into a documentary.

3. He served in the U.S. Navy.

Bannon signed up to serve right after college, spending four years at sea, according to Bloomberg. His daughter Maureen followed in his footsteps, attending West Point and then serving as a lieutenant in the 101st Airborne Division.

4. He grew up in a family of Democrats in Norfolk, Virginia.

And he goes after Republicans, like Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, as well as attacking Democrats, like the Clintons.

“I come from a blue-collar, Irish Catholic, pro-Kennedy, pro-union family of Democrats,” Bannon told Bloomberg. “I wasn’t political until I got into the service and saw how badly Jimmy Carter f---ed things up. I became a huge Reagan admirer.”

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When his father, Marty Bannon, lost $100,000 selling off the long-held AT&T stocks he'd had after decades of working for the company, Bannon's self-described "economic nationalist" stance was solidified.

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"The only net worth my father had beside his tiny little house was that AT&T stock. And nobody is held accountable?” Bannon, told the Wall Street Journal. “All these firms get bailed out. There’s no equity taken from anybody. There’s no one in jail. These companies are all overleveraged, and everyone looked the other way.”

5. Bannon worked at the investment bank Goldman Sachs.

Bannon at Trump Tower last week.

GETTY

Though Trump's campaign promised to go after big banks, Bannon worked for one of the biggest.

After leaving the Navy, Bannon earned a master’s degree in national security studies at Georgetown University and then went on to Harvard Business School before landing an investment banking job at Goldman Sachs' New York offices.

“The camaraderie was amazing. It was like being in the Navy, in the wardroom of a ship," he told Bloomberg.

After leaving that bank in 1990, he started Bannon & Co., a boutique investment bank specializing in media. The bank was eventually bought and Bannon is no longer affiliated.

6. He has Hollywood ties.

When he ran his own investment bank, Bannon invested in films, and he eventually made the leap to directing movies, like In the Face of Evil, a celebration of the Ronald Reagan administration, and The Undefeated, a 2011 documentary about failed vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.

7. He said progressives vilify conservative women because they’re not "a bunch of dykes."

During a 2011 radio interview, Bannon said women like Ann Coulter, Michele Bachmann, and Palin threaten the progressive narrative.

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“That’s why there are some unintended consequences of the women’s liberation movement. That, in fact, the women that would lead this country would be pro-family, they would have husbands, they would love their children. They wouldn’t be a bunch of dykes that came from the Seven Sisters schools up in New England,” he said, referring to historic women’s colleges. “That drives the left insane and that’s why they hate these women.”

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8. He’s been wanting to shake up the Republican Party for years.

Breitbart News cheered on the Tea Party, a wing of the Republican Party, in its early years and supported the 2013 government shutdown, according to Bloomberg. In fact, in 2010, Bannon said in an interview, “What we need to do is bitch slap the Republican party.”

9. He was charged with domestic abuse.

In 1996, Bannon was charged with misdemeanor domestic violence, battery, and dissuading a witness, though the case was ultimately dismissed, according to a police report and court documents obtained by Politico.

The case was brought by his then-wife, who claimed Bannon pulled at her neck and wrist, then smashed her phone when she tried to call the police. His ex-wife did not appear in court and Bannon pleaded “not guilty,” so the case was dismissed.

10. His ex-wife has accused him of being anti-Semitic.

The same wife who accused Bannon of abuse said in 2007 court documents that he didn’t want their daughters to go to a particular school because of the number of Jewish students enrolled.

"The biggest problem he had with Archer is the number of Jews that attend," she said in her 2007 statement, according to the New York Daily News. "He said that he doesn't like the way they raise their kids to be 'whiny brats' and that he didn't want the girls going to school with Jews."

A spokesperson for Bannon told the Daily News: “At the time, Mr. Bannon never said anything like that.”

11. Bannon's site Breitbart News has regularly attacked Planned Parenthood, going so far as to compare their work to the Holocaust.

In an August 2015 article headlined “Planned Parenthood’s Body Count Under Cecile Richards is Up to Half a Holocaust,” the author writes that the women’s health organization, which provides a range of health services including abortions and which Trump has threatened to defund, has “comfortably surpassing Hitler according to its own annual reports. You have to admire the chutzpah, if you’ll forgive my terminology: Planned Parenthood has amassed a Third Reich-style death count completely legally.”

12. The Anti-Defamation League opposes Bannon's appointment.

The ADL released a statement over the weekend explaining why the group “strongly opposes” Bannon’s appointment.

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13. Those from the left and the right have come out against Bannon holding the new role.

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A spokesperson for then-Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said in a statement:

President-elect Trump’s choice of Steve Bannon as his top aide signals that white supremacists will be represented at the highest levels in Trump’s White House. It is easy to see why the KKK views Trump as their champion when Trump appoints one of the foremost peddlers of White Supremacist themes and rhetoric as his top aide. Bannon was ‘the main driver behind Breitbart becoming a white ethno-nationalist propaganda mill,’ according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Others spoke out on Twitter:

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Meanwhile, Trump supporters have continued to defend Bannon.

14. He has lashed out at the media.

On Jan. 26, 2017, Bannon said the media, not the Democratic Party, is the "opposition party." “The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for awhile,” he told the New York Times, adding, "The media here is the opposition party. They don’t understand this country. They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States.” He also said, "The media has zero integrity, zero intelligence, and no hard work.”

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15. He was briefly a member of the National Security Council.

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In January 2017, in a very unusual decision, Trump has reorganized the National Security Council by elevating Bannon and limiting the power of the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. Bannon will now sit in on the top inter-agency group for discussing national security, and experts are saying this is controversial, to say the least. Nancy Pelosi slammed the decision, saying it would make America less safe: “It’s a stunning thing, that a white supremacist would be a permanent member of the National Security Council,” she said.

Susan Rice, former Obama national security adviser, referred to the decision as “stone cold crazy,” in a tweet:

In response to Bannon's unprecedented control over the White House, the #StopPresidentBannon hashtag exploded on Twitter on Sunday.

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On April 5, Bloomberg reported that Bannon had been removed from the National Security Council, and the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff would be "regular attendees" at the council's principals committee.

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16. He gave a rare public appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference.

Bannon, who rarely speaks in public, sat on a panel with fellow top White House adviser Reince Priebus at CPAC in February. The pair insisted stories about their relationship being tense are false, and Bannon took the opportunity to blame any negative attention on the media, which he referred to multiple times as "the opposition party." He said: "If you look at the opposition party and how they portrayed the campaign, how they portrayed the transition and, now, how they're portraying the administration — it's always wrong."

17. There's an active investigation against him in Florida.

According to The Washington Post, Bannon was registered to vote in both New York and Florida last year. He listed his Florida address as a vacant Miami home, according to the report. And under Florida law, it is a third-degree felony to include false information on a voter registration application. When The Post inquired about the Miami-Dade County State Attorney's Office investigation into the the residency claim, they cited confidentiality rules for “active criminal investigative information.”

Exactly. One by one, the good ones fall like domino's, replaced by establishment goons. I am begining to believe Trump made a deal {he just LOVES to make a deal}. They will let him remain as President, even let him have a few of the goodies he wants, but they will have the final say as always. No repeal of Obamacare, no wall, no tarriffs, no changes to Muslim immigration, no jail time for the Clinton crime syndicate, no public disclosure of Obama's true nationality, no de-escalation in the middle east or anywhere else for that matter. Like the Who used to sing: "Meet the new boss.......same as the old boss". We won't get fooled again. This government is not going to be changed by any election. It is going to take rivers of blood before things get any better around here.

You have the example the model of the former Soviet and Eastern Europe, there is no way the current Soviet will end up differently but due to its global sheer size it will be much, much worse than the period which followed the collapse of the Eastern Europe's Soviet.

Agree, seems like Bannon was seeing more than he should. Earth is flat. I voted Trump, I'll never vote again. NASA is all lies, Trump signed that shithole for another year a couple weeks back, I'M DONE.

Providing evidence for claims and allegations is a must in the game of rational and critical thinking otherwise u r just an inflammatory agent trolling and ranting. So, links with credible evidence or fuck off